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How to remove yellowing from an old Atari case


mimo

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

Hi, I've done a bit of experimenting with 35% Hydrogen Peroxide and UK September sun (cloudy with a chance of no sun) and the results are impressive, but what I wanted to share is the way you can get the stuff to stay on the cases. I dissolved a few spoonfuls of wallpaper adhesive granules into 300ml of HP solution and a small pinch of Oxy stain remover, mixing well.

 

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=140573612932 <----Doesn't work

 

Wrapping everything in bubblewrap (I ran out of clingfilm) I placed everything on top of my shed roof at 5am before I went to work. After coming home at 530pm, I unwrapped and washed the cases (1050 & 800XL).

 

Great results for such a cloudy day but my 800XL top case came out in a bubble wrap rash! So the bubblewrap was a failure. The cases came out a lot better than I expected for just one dull day, and now look brand new (except for the bubblewrap pattern on top of the XL).

 

The wallpaper paste was a success though and I now plan to bleach my 65XE & 130XE, along with my 800, which is very yellowed.

 

I hope this gives some encouragement to other users to try it. It took me 2 hours to dismantle, clean and treat a 1050 & 800XL case and 1 dull day to expose them to (weak) sunshine. But it worked.

 

WARNING!!!!!

This chemical is <3PH, meaning it is extremely corrosive (acidic) - I got my hands burned not wearing protection, thinking I could avoid splashes etc. It doesn't work to hope you don't get any on your hands (it's painful and turns your fingers a chalky white).

Thank god I didn't splash any in my eyes! Please be careful and wear some latex gloves and change them frequently as drops can get into them without you knowing.

And don't touch your eyes either, could be catastrophic :-/

 

Good luck and give it a go

 

 

 

<<<<<<<<Edited to remove the bad link and replace with valid one<<<<<<

 

 

 

 

THIS should work (for UK eBay)

http://stores.ebay.co.uk/APC-PURE?_trksid=p2047675.l2563

Edited by biroballpoint
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  • 2 weeks later...

I just buy a pile of cheap weak peroxide, pour it in a clear container, add oxy till it stops dissolving and let her ride, maybe a little water to top it off

 

takes longer, requires good sun but dont do it on a hot day, but I have never had streaking and 10 bucks will make 3-4 gallons of the crap

 

I am going to try and do a machine this weekend depending on sun, if I do I will post my madness and results

Edited by Osgeld
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  • 1 year later...
  • 10 months later...

You can use electrical tape,thats what I did to my Atari 130XE and it looks alright,I can't stand the case,it looks cheap,you can get in it all different colours.Black I used,you can get white,blue,and orange.but I would use that colour.. ;) I did it to my c64 too.

 

One question I wanted to ask..If you smoke cigarettes (rollups) can that turn the cases yellow..?

 

See how yellow the disk drive is for the C64,will have to do that next in black tape.

post-40380-0-30994600-1476963113_thumb.jpg

post-40380-0-73831500-1476963117_thumb.jpg

Edited by Spanner
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  • 2 months later...
  • 3 months later...

To hell with sourcing peroxide. Following a recent blog post from Tezza, I soaked a yellowed c64 case in 4 cups of Oxyclean and a gallon + of water. 7 hours in the sun at about 60F ambient temperature, and the results have convinced me that this is the most cost effective way. I could have probably gotten by with less Oxyclean. A huge box of that stuff from Costco will set you back $16 and last a lot longer than the equivalent amount of hair cream or whatever.

 

Before and after pics posted.

post-15781-0-87817800-1491603979_thumb.jpg

post-15781-0-00098400-1491603999_thumb.jpg

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To hell with sourcing peroxide. Following a recent blog post from Tezza, I soaked a yellowed c64 case in 4 cups of Oxyclean and a gallon + of water. 7 hours in the sun at about 60F ambient temperature, and the results have convinced me that this is the most cost effective way. I could have probably gotten by with less Oxyclean. A huge box of that stuff from Costco will set you back $16 and last a lot longer than the equivalent amount of hair cream or whatever.

 

Before and after pics posted.

 

Addendum!!!! Sorry, I can't edit my original post for some reason (though I can edit this one, strange).

 

BUT, I may have gotten some blooming. It looks fine in regular light, but under fluorescent light there appears to be some discoloration around some "seam" areas. So I wanted to get that out there before I lead anyone astray. I may have overdone it with the Oxyclean.

Edited by gamer-stu
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Addendum!!!! Sorry, I can't edit my original post for some reason (though I can edit this one, strange).

 

BUT, I may have gotten some blooming. It looks fine in regular light, but under fluorescent light there appears to be some discoloration around some "seam" areas. So I wanted to get that out there before I lead anyone astray. I may have overdone it with the Oxyclean.

Yeah - I stopped adding Oxy years ago when I became convinced it dramatically increased the risk of blooming. Now I just use 40 Vol Creme Peroxide, but still managed to bloom the crap out of that 800XE a few posts back (hence the paint job, which gave a better result than Peroxide could possibly attain in this instance anyway).

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Finally pulled the trigger on a paint job on a badly streaked 800XE:

 

attachicon.gifDSCF6564.JPG

 

attachicon.gifDSCF6565.JPG

 

attachicon.gifDSCF6568.JPG

 

attachicon.gifDSCF6569.JPG

 

Paint used: Plastikote Window Grey (satin finish). Had to "dust" the console keys to blend them in, so the lettering is a bit faded now but still legible.

 

 

Jon

nice job on this. couple of questions:

1] did you paint the vents? - and how difficult a job was that?

2] anyone know the nearest colour-match (Plastikote or other) for the XL cream and brown?

thanks

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Thanks!

 

1) Yes: just approached the vents from either side with thin coats.

2) Ice cream white is a good match for the cream colour (will double check later). The brown needs to be way dark and I never found a good match for that.

 

You can get a better look at the paint tin and the paint job here:

 

Edited by flashjazzcat
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  • 2 weeks later...

I had my first go at restoring a yellowed case today, choosing a 1050 case. Using the Creme Peroxide (40 vol 12%) lightly brushed on and then wrapped cling-film, this was left outside in good sunshine for just over an hour and a half, re-applying a little more creme around the hour point. The lower half of the case was still good underneath and so gives a good idea of the before after.

 

post-1822-0-40807200-1494186550_thumb.jpg

 

Results were pretty good though I think another round will get out some bits you can still see close up.

 

post-1822-0-88320600-1494186556_thumb.jpg

 

This is more visible when the case is put back together but doesn't show as much on the photo.

 

post-1822-0-91536000-1494186567_thumb.jpg

 

Overall happy to try this again later on some 800XL cases and anything else I can find in need of it.

 

The peroxide was obtained on Ebay as a few weeks back I did try at a Sally's store but was (correctly) told I should be in trade to purchase it.

Edited by Wrathchild
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After doing a bunch of stuff with the Clairol 40 creme, I feel like it's pretty foolproof. Other brands have different ingredients (I checked) and there may be something about Clairol's particular formula that makes it safer. But I have done my 800XL, my IIGS keyboard and part of the case (I'm actually using it for testing different methods), my C64, my ST keyboard and mouse, and maybe one or two other things I'm forgetting. All of them turned out so well that it actually surprised me, because I'm pretty sloppy with this stuff. No matter what I do, I get it on non-white parts, labels, etc. and it always comes out looking fine. Worst case I need to do something again to take it a little further, but I haven't yet had any blooming or streaking or anything.

 

I also use giant zip-lock bags, not plastic wrap, because we have some stray cats around here and a couple of them like my porch and I don't want them thinking this is food and trying to eat it. But the zip lock bags are a lot harder to deal with and stuff slides around and rubs the cream off some areas and puts it on others where it's not supposed to be. Still, it always comes out looking nice.

The attached pic is a cell phone pic, and the slight color shift in the white panel is either just my phone or the lighting. It looks 100% even in real life.

post-6166-0-86298200-1494202189_thumb.jpg

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  • 2 weeks later...

Be careful with this stuff. I have seen more than a couple computers around these days with weird white stripes and smudges on the body and especially the keys. Looks like permanent damage from people trying to retro-brite.

 

That apparently happens if you either mix it yourself and use too much OxyClean, or you use some kind of pre-mixed stuff that itself either has too much sodium percarbonate or some other additive that's destructive.

 

I really think the best thing to do is look at the list of harmful additives, then find a premixed solution that doesn't include any of them. The worst are apparently things like terpene; I've also seen certain acids listed as harmful (though others are fine). I found an actual list somewhere of chemicals to avoid at one point but I can't find it now. But that's how I decided on the Clairol (pretty sure it's Clairol) vs. other brands at Sally Beauty Supply.

 

The fact that the premixed products have *any* additives is one reason some people avoid them, but it's just as dangerous mixing yourself because you're still doing it basically through trial and error, and it's the kind of thing where 1/4 teaspoon too much Oxy can be the difference in it not working at all vs. getting blooming or streaking. This is one case where fewer ingredients is not necessarily better; it's all about the mix.

 

So I guess the point is yeah, be careful, but if you get the right formula, then you can basically spill it all over everything and it'll be fine. It's like, either the formula's right, or it's not.

 

Even with the right formula, though, the one caution I'd have for people is to not go too far with it. This stuff is basically a bleaching agent. It's not really restoring the color to what it was; retrobrite doesn't know what the original color was. Machines like the C64 were brown to begin with, not light grey; the Atari XL's were kind of a soft beige, as were Apple II's and most other computers of the era. I've seen people make them really stark white, and they were never that color to begin with. You've gotta keep checking every hour or so to make sure you don't go too far in removing pigment.

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  • 4 weeks later...

So I tackled the case of my "Ugly Duckling" 1200XL today ... (*)

 

40% peroxide liquid, a couple of hours in the sun under platic wrap and one or two wipe-downs with more at hourly intervals. The difference is striking! When my wife realized what I was doing, she offered me me her cream peroxide, which I will use tomorrow for the edges and one or two spots on the top that need it. I also clearly need to do the bottom!

 

post-30400-0-13951100-1497136829_thumb.jpg

 

post-30400-0-11490300-1497136915_thumb.jpg

 

post-30400-0-37648500-1497136923_thumb.jpg

 

(*) Any tips on separating the white and brown parts of the top case on a 1200XL specifically? I see where there are tabs holding the top of the brown keyboard frame to the white part, and clip-like pieces that snap over the edge at the bottom, but when I tried to flex them apart to separate the halves it seemed as though the case might crack before the clips released.

 

 

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Looks good. Key to getting the brown panel off is gently pulling it forward while you prise off the tabs. Hard to explain (could video it tomorrow night?).

 

A video demonstrating would be fantastic, thanks! Given the timezone stuff, I probably won't be able to watch live but I'd love to see how it's done.

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